


Blue

by en passant (corinthian)



Category: Fate/Grand Order
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-23
Updated: 2016-04-23
Packaged: 2018-06-04 01:33:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6635632
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/corinthian/pseuds/en%20passant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mundane au. A sort of "just life" story.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Before

Summer came early and brought rain and heat. The May flowers bloomed, wilted and then were drowned in quick succession. Arjuna's eldest brother graduated on the second Saturday of the month, on the hottest weekend that May. It had poured all morning, so much so that the audience's chairs sunk into the mud and the noon sun didn't dry anything out — it just boiled the still water, creating stifling humid heat.

Some part of him didn't want to be there. It was an undesired feeling — to not want to celebrate his brother's accomplishments — but Arjuna still had a month of studies left. He would graduate the following year, a few years ahead of schedule. It had always been difficult for him to shift his focuses, and Saturday was normally a much needed day for work. In short, Arjuna was stressed and after forty-five minutes of sitting in the audience, crowded in among his family and strangers while the names were read he began to feel irritated. He was hyper-aware of the sweat on his palms, the uncomfortable ridge in the middle of the plastic chair he was seated on, the puddle of mud beneath his feet, the way that the twins kept rustling their pamphlets and whispering to each other and the sun — just above, but casting an uneven heat on the left side of his head. A thousand things passed through his mind, each categorized as acceptable or not, sorted and filtered.

He thought too many unkind things, waiting for his brother to cross the stage and get his diploma. He was aware of it and that only served to irritated him more. Arjuna did not think of himself as an unkind person, and he loved his brother very much. So when he (finally!) heard their family name he felt his heart lift with joy but when he swept his eyes toward the stage he was unprepared for what he saw.

That was not his brother — nor was the name that followed his brother's. It was an entirely different boy. Same year, same last name, dressed in the same black graduation gown. He looked like a ghost, however. Pale skin, pale hair and even from as far away as Arjuna was, he could tell, pale blue eyes.

(It might have been his imagination, but their eyes met and Arjuna felt oddly displaced. The sweat on the back of his neck ran hot, the air in his lungs cold. Everything seemed backwards.)

Next to him, his mother inhaled sharply and beside her, his father looked studiously away. Even the twins quieted and the entire family seemed to be in silent disarray. The moment passed. Arjuna's brother walked the stage, they applauded. Somehow, though, the afternoon had been ruined by a boy that Arjuna had never met and never heard of in his entire life. No one wanted to speak of it later, it was is the entire graduation ceremony had never occurred. His brother's accomplishment lost in the terse silence between family members.

Despite having enough time to return to his studies, after the ceremony and the reception and the celebratory dinner, he did not. His mother joked, but with a tight smile still, that it must be a special occasion, since he's always so studious. The kind of nice boy who skipped parties, often. A little too respectable. So, he lingered around his brother's friends, floated in and out of their conversations and smiled when his aunties asked him to.

He loved his family, but surrounded by them he could only feel separated and he could only think of that afternoon and the odd sensation of being turned inside out. Yes. He had felt undoubtedly taken apart by a single look. His heart had skipped a beat and in retaliation he had decided in that very instint.

He hated Karna.

A person he had never met, still, and didn't even know but he hated nonetheless. He repeated the statement in his head as he greeted the rest of his family, congratulated his brother, ushered the twins away from the buffet table. He hated Karna. He hated Karna. He hated Karna. Somehow, the mantra warmed him, resettled his feelings of unease. It didn't matter that both his parents had become uncomfortable, that his father steered the conversation forcibly away from Karna or that even Arjuna's eldest brother was hiding something from him. He hated Karna and that was enough to make everything in the world right again.

That epiphany out of the way, Arjuna could return his life to normal.

* * *

The weekend of Arjuna's own high school graduation was picture perfect. A trail of wispy clouds dotted the bright blue sky and the temperature was a little chill, but perfect for students wearing heavy black gowns.

He wouldn't have said that he was nervous. It was nothing more than a formality, an expectation, and Arjuna simply had to walk across the stage and receive his diploma. He could see his family in the crowd, even his eldest brother had flown in just for his graduation. That had felt a little unnecessary. High school graduation, Arjuna had decided, wasn't that big of a deal. It was just another inevitable step in his life. (But, naturally, he had smiled and welcomed his brother with a hug. Thank you for coming, I appreciate it.)

As he stepped across the stage, something caught his attention. Just a trick of the light, really. A burst of rainbows edged in red at the corner of his eye — light reflecting off of the windows of the science building. He blinked and just over the shoulders of the crowd watching him he saw the blueness of the sky for what it truly was.

It was so disorienting. His body remembered what to do, stepped forward and accepted his diploma. He shook hands with the dean and descended the stage steps to rejoin his class. But internally, he reeled. It had felt like he was going to get swallowed up by the world, the sky, the meaninglessness of everything. The piece of paper between his hands held no more truth in it than a single molecule of air. It existed but it didn't mean anything.

He wondered, as they shuffled along to be congratulated by their parents and other family members, if there had been any point in being alive after all. (He remembered to smile at the reception, to greet everyone properly, accept congratulations and gifts. He remembered to nod along with all of the claims and boast at the proper moments, Arjuna was going to go far in life, he's a talented boy.)

What was he going to do next? What college was he going to? Where did he see himself in five years? Did he have a girlfriend?

All of those questions were easy to answer. Pre-med was next. A top 15 school was good, but not good enough. He hadn't gotten into his reach school — but they all had known that anyway. They still brought it up anyway though, joking at his failure. But it's fine, they said, because he's a good boy and a good student and he'll be a good doctor, when it's all over with.

"Thank you for coming," Arjuna told his oldest brother, when they had a moment, "You didn't have to."

"Of course, it's an important event, isn't it?"

The sky behind his brother, again, too bright and too blue, distracted Arjuna. He nodded and smiled and said something polite. It hadn't felt important. It hadn't felt real either, even later when everyone had left and they had cleaned up the party and Arjuna climbed into bed and looked at the familiar ceiling of his bedroom.

He had, perhaps, expected his life to change. But it seemed nothing could knock him off his path. Well, that's how it should be. Success and all. He was a good brother and a good son, and this was enough.

* * *

Two years later, Arjuna's oldest brother failed out of law school. Arjuna withdrew from private college to pursue studies closer to home at the local college. For family reasons, probably. Finances, everyone assured each other, were not an issue.

* * *

It was the family's pet joy that Arjuna was a gifted musician. It wasn't really worth pursuing professionaly, of course, not when he was so gifted at so many other, more worthwhile, things. But he had a talent for the piano, violin and French horn, of all things. After he moved home, Arjuna picked up a part time teaching piano to children, and another as a math tutor, and a third, working the information desk at the library.

He was good enough.

* * *

On Arjuna's 21st birthday, near the tail end of the fall semester of his final year of college, his friends took him out to a bar. Loosen up, have fun, we want to see the prince lose his cool. They joked, rubbed his back, ruffled his hair.

Arjuna liked them, well enough. He was sure he was expected to, they were his classmates. They were smart, enough, studied, enough and in the end they were the ones who pulled him away from work to have fun. They were, probably, good friends.

— third shot, he elbowed the friend to the right of him back, almost tentatively. They talked about their senior projects, comps, papers, teachers.

— eighth shot, Arjuna bumped shoulders with any friend in reach. They laughed about the bartender's mustache, the deer head hanging behind the bar, the rumored toe-soaking-in-vodka-martini.

— twelve, Arjuna had stopped laughing two shots ago. He gripped someone's shoulder, tightly, asked them if they could tell where his feet were.

— fifteenth, he bumped his head on the bathroom doorframe.

— twenty-first shot and Arjuna was outside. He had, probably, stepped outside for air, maybe he had said that. His friends were all sitting with their arms over each other's shoulders and singing happy birthday and he had gone outside. It was too noisy. He couldn't hear himself think. He thought about his hands on his jeans, the texture of his pants and how it was never quite as expected. The taste of whatever shot he had had last at the back of his throat, a lot like rising bile. The blue of the sky on his graduation day. The look his mother gave him every Thursday night when he visited to help around the house. The questions about when he was going to settle down with a girl. Schoolwork. Teachers. The dog he had growing up that had died at age four, from her stomach flipping over from gas, or something. He had been too young to really understand it. How much he hated the song Happy Birthday. His second college girlfriend who he had broken up with at the beginning of this semester, because they seemed incompatible. He didn't miss her. His father's work shoes. Maybe, he wasn't good enough. The twins should be going away for school soon. It was so fucking loud. He didn't really like the taste of vodka after all. He had a craving for fried cheese. He thought about how he wasn't happy, but he was thrilled and he couldn't feel his toes and the world pitched violently upward with every step he took.

He vomited. Arjuna swayed and dropped to his knees in the parking lot behind the bar and leaned away from the pool of his own vomit and clutched at his chest. He could be dying, for all he knew. It was pretty unbecoming.

"...inexperience." It was probably judgment on his ability to hold his alcohol, but Arjuna couldn't help but to scowl and protest immediately. He probably said something like _I'm very experienced._ but even to his own ears the statement sounded pathetic.

He couldn't really feel the hand on his forehead, the arms that hooked under his own and dragged him up. He knew it was happening, but his head was spinning and if there had been anything left in his stomach, he would have thrown that up too. 

The next morning Arjuna only remembered the soft texture of someone's black jacket — held too tightly, because walking had been too hard — and the thought that the night sky shouldn't have been that pale of a blue.

* * *

On his first emergency rotation, Arjuna thought he wouldn't be able to cut it. The hospital was far too cluttered and busy and full of the stink of the death and sick and dead. The shift was 12 hours and by hour six he already felt in over his head. His patience unraveled faster than he could hold in his temper. One of nurses even noticed the cracks in his smile.

"First day? Don't worry, everyone makes mistakes." She gave him a thumbs up. "When I get too stressed I just think about how many people need me and how unfair it is that we're overstaffed. Anger's a powerful motivator."

So, when on hour ten, the last shred of his composure snapped, Arjuna thought of the only thing that had ever broken through his own thoughts. (Intrusive, disorienting, blinding.) Just through the curtains there was a sliver of sky — gray and wet with rain, but he could picture it pale blue, if he tried hard enough.

That was good enough.

With clarity, he remembered, a graduation afternoon that had sent shockwaves through his entire family and a boy — who must now be much older — that he had irrationally disliked. It made him laugh, a little, shortly.

Perhaps it was because he was competitive by nature, or because she was right and anger is a powerful motivator, but he was easier to stand up straight then. It was ridiculous and petty but he could imagine himself doing better than that boy. As if everything that had ever been wrong in his life started in that moment — as if the family debt and Arjuna's own decisions to move back home, any small disagreement and his late father's heart attack had all started then — it gave him something to focus on.

Despite you, he could think, I'm good enough.

(It had never really beein a fair competition to begin with.)


	2. After

On his free Sundays, Arjuna goes to the coffeeshop around the corner from his apartment. He often works second shift on the weekends, but when he can it's nice to see something other than his apartment walls, the gym and the hospital. 

He almost drops his coffee — the newspaper, because he he likes the feeling of leafing through something while people watching at the cafe, however doesn't escape his inattention to scatters across the floor. Behind him in line, all along, had been someone so familiar and yet so foreign seeing him again was shocking.

They both had changed, over time. Arjuna had grown taller, filled out — not missing the awkward gangly years, of course — begun to wear glasses in school, though he had switched to contacts more recently. And, the name comes immediately to mind even after all that time — Karna. Still pale and just as on graduation day dressed in black, but there's something almost oddly inhuman about him. Arjuna can't help but think there's something off about his posture or expression — the completely closed look on his face that contrasted too much with the warmth in his eyes.

"You dropped something." Karna says, his tone so even and non-judgmental Arjuna can't help but feel judged.

"Great, thanks for that." Arjuna replies, far more snidely that is in character. He can't help but blanch a little as soon as the words leave his mouth.

"Need a hand?" Karna asks.

"No, I'm fine." Arjuna says, too quickly. He gathers up the fallen papers, trying to not feel ridiculous as Karna just stands there and watches him. It's as if Karna has no idea about what is polite or not, or he's actively trying to make Arjuna feel small. It's irrational to think these thoughts, but they roll through Arjuna's head at the speed of a train. What's he doing here. Why now, why this guy. Why wasn't Arjuna ever good enough, in the end?

"It's not bad to ask for help," Karna comments, after Arjuna tucks the newspaper under one arm, and then adds, "Or to express irritation at someone. Communication is hard enough, without obscuring things on purpose."

"I have no reason to be irritated." Arjuna snaps.

They stand in silence for a moment, before Karna turns to get his coffee that's waiting for him at the counter. Arjuna seats himself at his usual table, in the back near the window. Karna's shadow falls across his table, just briefly enough for Karna to add, in parting, "I hope to see you around more."

"Goodbye." Arjuna says in response.

* * *

Every month a letter arrives to Arjuna's old house — the one he grew up in, his parents' old house — that the family hasn't lived in for at least five years. The brothers had sold it, after their mother passed only two years after their father. The current residents, not recognizing the name on the envelope, toss it into the recycling, every month.

The letter is short and simple, always the same content. Always signed, I hope you are well and we can meet again, mother.

* * *

The next thing Karna says to Arjuna is, "I don't think you want to jump."

It's not an inaccurate statement, but again, Arjuna feels that it's unwarranted. He's leaning over the ledge, out over the balcony railing, of an old lighthouse. The ocean waves break on the rocks below and set a light mist into the air. It's picturesque and if he leans far enough it feels that he might escape to a different place, a different time, a different lifetime where he feels less stagnant.

They didn't go together, but it's a nice summer day and of course, the lighthouse is not an unpopular destination.

"If I wanted to, it's not your place to stop me." Arjuna who doesn't want to jump, has to argue with Karna immediately, regardless.

"Don't you have a lot to lose?" Karna asks, steps closer so he's standing right next to Arjuna, also looks out across the ocean.

He wants to say, not really. It's a childish impulse that boils up in him, just like his temper and contrary hotheadedness. Instead Arjuna says nothing and keeps his eyes focused on a buoy out in the distance.

"You're fickle." Karna comments.

"You're irritating, and don't know when to shut your mouth." Arjuna scowls, darkly. 

"That may be true." Somehow, Karna's agreement sits even worse with Arjuna. As if he is still the villain in the situation. He knows, in honesty, that Karna has done nothing wrong and yet he can't queel the anger within him anyway.

"So, why bother me?"

"Getting to know each other wouldn't be so bad."

"We don't have any reason to."

"Don't we?"

Karna doesn't say it. They both know it. Arjuna grips the railing more tightly.

"I don't want anything to do with you." (It's too easy to get trapped, thinking thoughts he had when he was a kid. Thinking about how he hated Karna and how his own ugly feelings carried him through various trials and tasks. It's embarrassing. Arjuna is too old to be so petty, now.) "But I can't deny that we have a connection."

"We'll see where it leads us."

* * *

They go see a baseball game together, and end up arguing over every call the umpire makes. They agree, an outing every two months. It's not like they're children who need to make nice. Estranged brothers who don't know each other is complicated enough. Arjuna spends a weekend helping paint Karna's new apartment, stocking it with paper goods and nonperishable foods. Karna picks Arjuna up, after a fenderbender two cities over rip the exhaust pipe off of Arjuna's car.

They get along, and they fight. The only time Arjuna raises his voice is on the times when he's with Karna. And, one time, Karna throws him out — physically — when their heated argument is loud enough that his neighbors bang on the wall.

But on a perfect summer day, when finally, a return to sender letter makes it way back to Karna, Arjuna wordlessly gathers up his keys and drives his brother to the cemetery.


End file.
